Giving My Friends Bookish Descriptions.

A while ago, my best friend Kriti, who runs the blog Kittu’s Modern Mixtape, wrote a very beautiful bookish description of me, and two days ago, on an Instagram live, I said that I would definitely like to try writing something similar sometime. Yesterday, Kriti wrote yet another bookish description of me in her post ‘Writing My Friends as Book Characters‘ (go check out her blog!) and she nominated me to carry this challenge forward, which I gladly accept because this sounds like a very fun way to give a new dimension to the people in my life.

As per the guidelines on Kriti’s post, I have decided to let these descriptions remain anonymous; so, feel free to come up with a nice mental image of your own when you’re reading these! I further nominate my friend Anupriya who runs the blog Amour Infini (go check out her blog!) to carry this challenge forward! Anybody else who wants to try something similar can take up this challenge, as well; the more, the merrier!

My best friend wrote ANOTHER bookish description of me! This is so beautiful, you guys! 🥺❤️
Read more of her bookish descriptions here:https://t.co/swrua3Aq1L pic.twitter.com/KARL50sQZ6

— Shubhangi Srinivasan (@_The_Shubhster_) September 13, 2020

Here are the bookish descriptions of my friends!

---

FRIEND #1

It had been a long time since she had run her fingers along the ivory keys of her piano. She hadn’t forgotten about it; that would be impossible because how do you forget something that will forever be a part of you? But, you know, life gets in the way sometimes and the very things that bring us peace are rudely pushed away and no matter how much you want to run back to them, there are other, more pressing matters at hand. As she sat down in front of her piano, wiping away the thin film of dust, she felt a weight she didn’t know existed, lift off of her shoulders. The way the keys felt under her fingers didn’t feel foreign to her; it feels like home, she thought before playing the first thing that came to her mind. Hands moving so gracefully with a flourish that was second nature to her, as though a muscle memory had kicked in, she hummed along to the song that had once brought her the comfort she hoped it would still bring her- “You’ll be alright, no one can hurt you now; come morning light, you and I’ll be safe and sound…” and for the first time in a very long time, she really believed that things would be better. They’d be alright and so would she.

---

FRIEND #2

Flipping through the pages of what looked like stories written long ago, he wondered why they had been left incomplete. He once had great plans for them; then again, they had seemed like a good idea back when he wrote them years ago. Eyes tracing the neatly written and occasionally scored out words, he sat down to read everything he had written. ‘Random Insignificant Story,’ he said to himself with a smirk as he read the title. Thinking about it, what he wrote then wasn’t insignificant at all; it was the start of something that had taken a back-seat for now. But you know, the thing about incomplete stories are that they’ll always be there for the writer, no matter when he chooses to go back to it. Who knows? Perhaps, he would finally pick up those stories where he had left them, or perhaps there was a certain charm to it while still incomplete. Maybe, someday, the world outside the ones closest to him would see what a masterpiece his words are. The best things always take time.

---

FRIEND #3

Hands wrapped around what seemed like the third cup of tea that day, she tried to find her pace in a world that was moving way too fast.When nothing seems to go your way, you desperately try to hold on to the thread that is helping you keep it all together. But what if that very thread is on the verge of snapping? Was she a damsel? Yes. Was she in distress? Also yes. But she had the strength of a warrior, the grace of a dancer and the heart of an old-school romantic; she saw the world differently and she felt things more deeply than most people would. If eternal love were to take the form of a human being, it would be her. You’d think that, as a dancer, balance came naturally to her. And yet, what was this feeling of imbalance that plagued her at that very moment? Letting out a breath that she didn’t realize she had been holding, she flipped through the pages of her journal— her confidante. Writing down all the thoughts that weighed her down had become a daily ritual a few years ago, and somewhere along the way, an inseparable part of her life. She’d give herself the assurance she’d need through her own words, and her words would give her the comfort she’d need when the world outside would move at a pace that felt to fast to keep up with. For there, in between the pages of her journal and painted in the colour of ink was the shelter she sought from her internal storms. It wasn’t the balance that she craved, but it came pretty close.

---

FRIEND #4

Years ago, at a crazy party, a girl walked over and congratulated me on the book I was writing. The book has long since been scrapped, but that girl stuck around. I’ve run into my closest friends in the most unlikely ways and I’ve always discovered that they have been worth keeping in my life. Not many people could look at the world the way she could— where most people saw flaws, she only saw beauty to be appreciated. It showed in the way she captured the way one’s eyes crinkled at the corners when they smiled, the way one’s hair would sweep over their face when it caught the breeze, the way the light fell on one’s face giving them a glow that looked almost heavenly. She would take a little bit of the world home at the end of every day. The way she wrote would hit you hard and make you feel things as though they had been buried inside you all along. They say that artists usually seek each other out and perhaps that is how fate made us walk into each other’s lives. Who knows what would have happened if we had simply passed each other by that night? Perhaps I’d have missed out on a great friend, but to think that I would have missed out on the opportunity to have known somebody as incredible as her, an artist in every sense of the word, still makes me wonder if people truly walk into our lives for a reason.

---

I might have been way off-mark on this one because this is my first attempt at something like this. I hope you liked reading all of these bookish descriptions of my friends. Most importantly, thank you Kriti, my best friend, my soulmate, for making me try new things with my writing! I hope to try more things out with my writing in the future.

Yours truly,
The Shubhster. Xx

---

Featured Image by Syd Wachs on Unsplash